


Snapshots

by wolfmother24



Category: The Vampire Diaries (TV)
Genre: Domestic Fluff, F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-01-10
Updated: 2015-02-14
Packaged: 2018-03-07 01:21:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 10,991
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3155543
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wolfmother24/pseuds/wolfmother24
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kai didn't find the knife his sister Jo hid in the tree stump and ms. cuddles still holds all of Bonnie's magic is in the future with the gang, who haven't found a way to bring her back. These are just snapshots of her life with Kai.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

1

Kai paced in the boarding house living room like a maniac, pausing every once in a while to look at Bonnie incredulously.

'Are you sure?...maybe you're just ...you know? Late.'

'Well, we'll find out now wont we?...' Bonnie said, glaring at him, she was pissed off. She hadn't been this angry, since...well, forever. And Kai's continued pacing back and forth wasn't helping. 'Then what are we waiting for!? Shouldn't we take a look now?'

Bonnie rolled her eyes, 'You have to give the test at least three full minutes Kai.'

If looks could kill, Bonnie could have died a hundred times in the one minute he spent glaring back at her with hands at his sides, clenching and unclenching. They looked like they were itching to throttle her or worse. She raised an eyebrow and he came and sat on a chair next to her, sweaty and exasperated, 'Maybe it's just a fluke, you Mystic Falls folks have a habit of being dramatic anyway... It can't be possible, you are not pregnant.' He finished resolutely, patting her knee.

Bonnie shoved his hand away, gritting her teeth, 'Are you serious!? You're saying I'm doing this is as some twisted attempt at seeking your attention? That I just happened to wake up this morning and thought a pregnancy scare is going to scare you dead?!'

Kai turned to her after breath of practiced patience, 'I don't know...I don't know what you're coping mechanisms been like after being trapped here for 8 months! You could want my attention after trying to kill me every day for 5 months.'

When she opened her mouth to protest, he quickly cut her off, sitting up straight, 'Hey! It's possible, we're the only people on this world...literally! And for the record, whose idea was it to get drunk and have sex? Not mine! After two decades of not getting any, I like to be sober when I have my encounters, thank you very much.'

Bonnie let out a strangled laugh at his deliberation, 'Excuse me, you're the one who doesn't even remember whether you used protection or not, so quit passing the buck and shut up!'

She got up and left the room feeling frustrated tears prickling the corners of her eyes, ignoring Kai's indignant, 'Where are you going?, we were having a serious discussion...'

She needed a drink before going back to the bathroom and peering at that pregnancy test. If she was pregnant, god help her, she would need a coping mechanism. She thought she had found a coping mechanism. Running, the violence, and sex wrapped up in a mad sequence of events ever since she sent her magic to the future with ms. cuddles. For five months after their permanent incarceration to the year 1994, he chased her, she hid from him, he found her, tried to hurt her, she killed him or got away, and then rinse and repeat. Until, one night she was so sick of the feeling of being wrongly abandoned and pathetic about her life in this hell that she just quit running and waited for Kai to find her nestled under soap suds and bubbles in the boarding house, and he stood wide eyed and stumped when she came out of the tub in nothing and told him, deadpan, 'This is just a one off, you need to scratch an itch, and I need an itch scratched'.

Needless to say, he didn't need telling twice, and it wasn't a one time thing after all. And now she might be pregnant because the idiot may or may not have used protection when they fell into bed drunk and completely irresponsible. They both had rules for sleeping together; spending the night afterwards, no sneaky killing attempts from her, using protection, but no drugging, stabbing, or restraints from him, etc.

If by some miracle the test shows up negative, they'll have to add: being sober during- to the list of rules. Wait, she was not sleeping with him after this, never again. Ever.

She poured bourbon from a half empty bottle Damon liked to frequent when he'd been stuck here and turned around to find Kai, with his arms crossed, watching her intently with a miserable pout. When he saw the bourbon in her hand, he swiped the bottle and the glass from her hands, downing the shot she poured for herself it in one motion, 'Hey... give me that...'

He pointed in the direction of the bathroom, where she left the pregnancy test on a flat surface. 'Fat chance, now move! It's been four minutes...' He marched her into the bathroom and waited outside a good few feet away, waiting for her.

'You're not pregnant, you're not pregnant, it's going to be negative...' Bonnie kept muttering the calming mantra and picked up the edge of the test and opened her eyes at the count of three, and there it was...

Kai took to sitting at in an uncomfortably overstuffed chair and called to her, 'So? What's the verdict Bon-Bon?, it doesn't take forever to figure out what an itty bitty test says...'

When she didn't answer him, he felt a prickle of concern and went to the bathroom. She was sitting on the floor quietly, one hand still clutching the test. He resisted the urge to curse loudly and just squatted near her, looking from her to the test. It was positive.

So, he did forget the protection after all. Considering how freaked he was a few minutes ago, he was surprised to find himself feeling completely calm and under control now. He knew how to deal with situations, it was uncertainty he found hard to cope with. Now that he knew he was dealing with an angry and positively pregnant Bonnie, he could make things work. So, when a tear escaped the beautiful woman's eyes, in front of him, he sighed and made himself comfortable next to her. 'There, there, we'll manage, as long as you don't except me to be in the delivery room with you...' He joked, patting her knee gently.

Bonnie shoved away his hand half heartedly, feeling detached and dazed by the positive pregnancy result in her hand. She was pregnant. Dammit. She was an idiot!

What would Damon or Elena, or any of her other friends think of her, if they came back for her someday? She's been trapped over here for almost an entire year now, chances were, if they hadn't gotten around saving her by now, they might have given up and moved on with their lives. Was it such a bad thing, if she tried to move on with hers, however twisted and strange her way of moving on might be?

When Kai wrapped an awkward arm around her shushing her sudden inexplicable emotional response- brought on by hormones no doubt, she didn't move away, or shove his arm away, at least not immediately.


	2. Chapter 2

2.

'So, Sass mouth Bennett, are you making a move or what?' He asked her hunched over with intense excitement. He poured pork rinds straight from the pack into his mouth, crunching loudly to make a point.

Bonnie resisted the urge to throw something at him, 'Be quiet and let me think Kai...I need to focus.' Her brain was telling her to make the move, but some intuition told her Kai was already a step ahead of her. She stopped massaging her aching temples and took a deep breath, deciding to go with her instincts. Hopefully, she can recover from whatever counter-attack he threw her way.

They sat across facing each other, over the monopoly board. 10 out of the 10 times they've played monopoly, Kai's won. He's infuriately good at it. Bonnie usually pouted, or called him a compulsive cheater and a few other thoughtful insults before storming out of the room. But tonight she demanded a re-match. She hasn't even had the sporadic rounds of morning sickness lately, which means somewhere in the universe her winning streak is alive and tonight she was going to win monopoly dammit!

Even though, after one and half hours of playing, she's had to give away most of her assets and has little or no money left to buy anything or make any moves that will benefit her. What was more infuriating then knowing you're losing, again?...Kai with his I-got-game-bitches-grin after every asset and sliver of cash he exploited from her.

'Oh Bonnie, Bonnie, you're still so naive and silly when it comes to this game, you don't get it...I've had over eighteen years to study and perfect my moves...you'll never beat me, not in a billion years.'

Bonnie flicked a pork rind off the board at his face, ignoring the resulting look of feigned pain. 'You've been playing yourself the whole time, that's not exactly honing your skills.'

But then how was he was winning every game!

'Oh you're just jealous sweetheart, I'll tell you what, why don't I let you win this one time, so that both of us can call it night and go to bed...I'm wasted over here.'

That did it! Bonnie reached over and snatched the pork rinds from him, she crumpled the bag and tossed it into the unlit fire place. 'We are playing until the games over, you got that? Now stop cheating like an asshole!'

Kai smiled at her completely unapologetic. He always enjoyed these bursts of anger from her. Especially, lately, since her hormones had recently started acting completely crazy, she's been going from phases of angry firecracker to a weepy violent mess in an hour. The smile he gave her was so strikingly similar to the one he flashed her a week ago when she was relaxing in one of the many Salvatore bathtubs and trying to calm herself from her building anxiety over this pregnancy, and he stood shaving meticulously a few feet away in the mirror. It's only when she was about to point out that he missed a spot, he caught her staring and gave her a sly wink and grin, it's then she realised with a start that he was doing what he did best... being a sneaky son- a-of-a-bitch.

He's been secretly moving in to Salvatore boarding house with her for weeks now. Bonnie was unsure whose idea it was, not to talk about their living arrangements but when at first they hadn't come to an agreement about how to go forward with things, Bonnie had told him point blank, she needed him out of her space, for a while at least. He huffed and puffed, they had a screaming match, but then he conceded with her demands and did just that for a few weeks. He left.

For a few weeks, he left her to her own devices as she tried to make peace with her choices and mistakes, feeling like an absolute moron about her predicament, and then she tried to swat away paranoia that she was being punished by some higher power for her association with casual murderers. Without a decent sounding board like Damon, she found this was hard to achieve.

Maybe Kai sensed her restlessness too because after a few weeks of being 'off the radar' he showed up, unannounced, in the boarding house kitchen, at dawn when she came downstairs after a particularly sleepless night. He made her French toast and before she could protest his presence, plonked down a glass of milk with a new bottle of prenatal vitamins in front of her. 'Calcium...' He told her importantly, as if that explained everything. She considered him quietly and he just shrugged at her continually stuffing his face with French toast.

And so they carried on and off with breakfast meetings for a few weeks in awkward silences, until, every once in a while he would find something to irritate her with and she found something to snark about. Now they were semi civil to each other. Well, most of the time and they filled their time with board games, re-watching the same shows on tv, cook offs, and bickering about each other's bad habits.

Bonnie does another check on her losses and angrily realises that she is still losing the game, so, it's a surprise when Kai casually asks for one of her last assets on the board with point black serious question, 'Were you and Damon in love?'

She stumbles at the question, there hadn't been any build up to it, and they hadn't really talked about the future, where ms. cuddles rested comfortably somewhere in Mystic Falls, and they certainly haven't talked about her friends since then; just like they didn't talk about Kai's family because neither of them knew how to be objective about each other's past. But the silent truce seems likes it not going to be enough now. Eventually, their skeletons are going to come bursting out of their closets. She sighs and cups the dice purposefully, 'Why are you asking?'

Jaw set, he's so still suddenly that she wonders how long he's been holding out on asking the question, 'Just wondering...inquiring minds and all that.' he says lightly, distractedly rearranging his cards and assets. Bonnie thinks maybe she should just refuse to answer the question and tell him it's none of it is his business, but then she felt an unreasonable surge of anger at his sudden jealousy, 'I don't know ...I mean we got close, the four months he was here...we were better friends here then when we were back home.' She admitted, her eyes moistening slightly at the memory of the first four months she and Damon spent trying to cope with the loneliness and the heartache of missing their loved ones. Her eyes met with Kai's and she cleared her throat uncomfortably. He seemed as still as ever though because the sullen, slightly disturbed expression was still there, he wanted to prod her, but now there was a certain wonderment in him, at her answer, 'How can you not know...that's just silly, I mean you were either in love, or you weren't...it can't be in between...throw the dice.'

Damon and her spent too much time missing their significant others to tap into their emotions for each other. Besides, you stick together without a soul in a world for four months, reliving the same date over and over; you kind of develop deep seated sentiments for each other without really accepting them. They spent far too much time thinking of ways to get back to Jeremy and Elena, she wondered though, if he was still here that sparks wouldn't have flown between them, or at least if they would have caved in and take comfort in each other.

She throws the dice, and it's a dud, she still can't move ahead, she passes the dice to Kai so he can take a turn, 'And you're and expert because?...'

He takes a chance, rolls the dice, and moves his piece along the board, the genial smile back in place, 'I'm not an expert, but it think it's obvious, at least to yourself when you're in love with someone. It's like this game, at a certain point you'll know on the inside when you're losing it and you know when you're winning it all.' Bonnie isn't quite sure about the point he's trying to make, but let's out a guffaw of laughter at the insinuation, 'You're not really comparing being in love to a game of monopoly ...seriously Kai? when was last time you were in love?'

The minute she says it, she regrets it because she knows he hasn't had a chance to be anything, anywhere, during his incarceration and because she likes the semi civility they have going on right now. Kai looks at her uncomfortably, from under his eyelashes, as though he didn't want her looking into his eyes, but she caught it. There it was. That fleeting look of disappointment and something else, a pointedly hurt look, which conveyed a hundred things she didn't like being privy to right now. She was not going to gape at him or giggle inappropriately feigning shock and dismay. It's not as if he outright said that he was in love with her, and thank god she had the presence of mind not to prod him because some things really were best left unsaid. And because she was conflicted about her emotions where he was concerned.

So, they both grew uncomfortably quiet at the crossroads of their thoughts, still looking down on the monopoly board.

Before the silence could stretch a little longer, she recovered, trying to keep from a familiar weepy side effect of her pregnancy, her voice rose barely above a whisper, 'I'm losing... aren't I?'

Now he looks up, back in control, and smiles at her softly, almost sadly, and Bonnie struggles not to feel guilty, 'There's always tomorrow Bonnie.'

She loses the game again, but this time doesn't upend the monopoly board on him and it's not the same banter and snark between them suddenly because the air is filled with unsaid silences. He tells her he needs some supplies and disappears somewhere while she wanders off to bed feeling tide over with a swirl of emotions indignantly trying to take her over.

She touches her stomach lightly trying to feel the beginnings of her pregnancy, the skin still taught and unaffected by the 4 weeks of developments, and finds herself unable to sleep. She's gotten too used to the sound of Kai snoring nearby.

He was sneaky like that.


	3. Chapter 3

Because they're far too emotionally reserved with each other, their confrontations tend to become angry stand-offs.

He talked too much and she was far too quiet about the numerous changes going on in her body. But there were those subtle moments where they were so in tune with each other's feelings and nuances that it was almost a surprise whenever their clumsily put together peace fell apart like intricately set up domino's in row.

One morning when she's particularly keyed up and wandering around in the vastly empty Salvatore pantry, she finds loose artisan tiles while he hovers over her; irate with her lack of communication or enthusiasm for being nowhere but at the Salvatore boarding house. It's only when he unceremoniously demanded she stopped moping around and come out with him once in a while she felt herself about to lose it. She hadn't left the boarding house for a while, and it sounded ridiculous but she felt as if leaving the boarding house meant letting go of her safety blanket.

What made it worse was she wasn't even sure what 'letting go' could do to her.

At first, she didn't move; instead, she clutched the tiles tighter, as if putting them back down would mean she was agreeing with him. This was there 3rd silent stand-off. Usually, one of them turned and left the other one. But today, Kai stood firmly in the doorway and she hovered near the neat stack of tiles defiantly.

She can practically feel him crossing his arms over his chest in that pensive way he does when he's about to lose the thread, 'Somehow I thought you were more mature than this…'

She wants to tell him to shut up and leave her alone, but she finds herself transfixed by the tiles because she's trying to remember what the modern day Salvatore house looks like and frustratingly, not a single thing comes to her.

Most of the time, there were many things they were not vocal about with each other, or on even on the same wavelength, but her tendency to wallow silently over the recent changes in her body and perpetual isolation had started to grate on his nerves lately, or at least he hinted at it while he squarely pointed out what was bothering her for the last few days, 'Damon's gone, he's not coming back for you Bonnie, you really need to get over it…'

And that did it for her. He just tipped over the damn domino.

The tile flies out of her hands before Bonnie could really think about it. It hit the wall behind him shattering into a few too many pieces and managed to earn a priceless look of shock from him, 'Did you just throw a fucking tile at me?!' he demanded, looking completely incredulous and partly enraged as she felt her body sooth with a gentle ripple of adrenaline.

This time she did think it through and picked up another tile, launching it in his general direction with the same reckless abandon. He quickly ducked again and she quickly picked up another one, feeling like she were on autopilot. 'Bonnie….' He started softly, like you would to a wounded and dangerous animal about ready to rip you to pieces. She sneered pulling back with the weighty tile in her hands as far as she could before launching another dangerous attack on him, and missed again.

'Put. Those. Tiles. Down…. now.'

She conceded with his demands slightly by lowering her arm and instead throwing the tile on the hardwood floor when he made a move to come closer to her. 'Stop-telling-me-what-to-do-Kai…just stop it!'

What she really wanted to say to him was to stop talking about Damon and let her wallow in peace, but the words wouldn't come; she wanted to tell him she hated the indirect way he continued to amble into her space and told her how to cope with her life. He almost always managed to pick up on the minute emotions related to the old part of her life that threatened to show up on her face from time to time, expect for the ones he would decide to ignore for a weighted period of time and then surreptitiously make a point about later on; like he was doing right now.

She hadn't even mentioned Damon and his impressive gossiping while cooking skills in forever. In fact, she made a conscious effort not to mention him because his name left a dull ache in her chest; one she had no idea of how to polarise and move on from. Kai telling her to suddenly let go of it all made her panic. He moves closer with his hands in mock surrender, and she's pretty sure he's about to make an unrestrained pounce on her, 'I'll stop telling you what to do when you calm down and stop flinging heavy inanimate objects at me.'

The irony was that he was one who sounded reasonable for once.

Except, she wasn't really listening to him anymore because she was busy crashing rest of the ridiculously beautiful tiles on the kitchen floor and seeing them smash into a shiny shards, and it gave her a strange sense of hollow relief during her panicked despair. When she looked up she realized her relief was meant to be short lived because Kai came charging over the small pile of broken tiles to wrestle the rest from her.

He applied pressure on her wrists and she twisted without relinquishing the offending articles. They were almost perceptively aware of each other's next move because when Bonnie tightened her grip on the tiles, he quickly let go of her wrists and gripped her in a solid bear hug, pinning her arms to sides, thereby, restraining any of her further attempts to play frisbee with the tiles.

They crashed down, heaving in angry breath for a few minutes on their knees before Kai told her she was bleeding.

'Great..'

* * *

 

'I'm not completely helpless you know?! I can do this myself.'

Bonnie lay on bed with her right foot propped up on a cushion while Kai handled a bottle of iodine solution shaking his head. She wouldn't have missed the blatant look of frustration on his face if she hadn't been so hypnotised by the viscous blood, casually dripping from a half an inch gash under the fleshy part of her ankle. The pale towel under her foot starts to stain a deep crimson, and she thinks the stain is never going to come out.

She may have stepped on the debris of shattered tiles during their struggle and gotten her foot impaled. Afterwards, they sat arguing pointlessly for about five minutes until Kai rolled his eyes, picked her up in his arms, and brought her upstairs to the bedroom.

He dipped a wad of gauze in disinfectant and propped a chair near the injured foot to have better access to it. 'You know, this wouldn't have happened if you hadn't thrown the tile at me.' He reasoned mildly, while she lay defensively with her arms crossed over her chest, glaring daggers at his mild expression of contempt. 'This wouldn't have happened if you weren't being an ass and hadn't attempted a throw down with me.'

He winked at her deliberately before pressing the gauze against her wound a little harder than necessary and Bonnie groaned unhappily missing the feeling of throwing something heavy and sharp at him.

'I apologise, I was a bit emotionally disturbed by you throwing a gigantic tile at me, and I mean, I know we haven't tussled in a while, but that was just...cold Bonnie.' He looked vaguely disturbed by her and her antics, while she lay there looking perfectly guilt free, it's not as is she managed to nail him with the tiles, 'Oh trust me, you were asking for it...' Damn it, her reasoning sounded twisted even to her, was she becoming like him?

Kai only gave Bonnie a bemused smile before plunging a needle near the wound and injecting the area with an anaesthetic. She gritted her teeth at the feeling of the needle pierce her skin and counted to ten as he removed it and then gave her foot a slightly vicious tug closer to his chest, 'Well then this is some kind of poetic justice isn't it?...now, you can be at my mercy for a change.' Bonnie uttered an unintelligible curse under her breath and he looked up from studying a gaping wound below her ankle. 'You mumbled my queen?'

'I said I can take care of myself.'

'Ah..ah..ah...you can't stitch yourself up.' He produced a pair of serious looking scissors and sterile suture wire while Bonnie unsuccessfully managed a grimace. She was beginning to feel slightly queasy at the sight of the blood and Kai's clinical ministrations, but then just about everything made her queasy these days. They'd charted her progress to 11 weeks so far and physically she's feeling frightening internal changes that she can't seem to vocalise around him without convulsing in panic for a few days.

'That's not what I mean Kai.'

He caressed the heel of her foot gently, running idle soothing circles down the curve, and his voice isn't the same light hearted shtick anymore, 'I know what you meant Bonnie...the writing just literally bounced off the fucking walls today didn't it?...' He sounded so unreasonably mad that Bonnie felt a sick sense of achievement at seeing the deepening frown line between his eyebrows.

She can tell he's trying to hold back on admonishing her with further angry wisecracks and vicious bites of sarcasm because his lips are almost a thin white line with the effort of keeping them closed.

Their eyes meet quietly and he regresses a little, still holding her bleeding foot, 'Do you feel anything?...'

Thrown for a minute, she almost answers the unsaid question in his eyes, but then realises he's squeezing her heel of her foot and let's her shoulders sag with involuntary relief.

'No, it's numb...'

He doesn't look at her again and gets to work with the suture and gauze, giving her four neat stitches and a clean bandage over it. Once again she notes how meticulous and careful he is with closing the wound. It's hardly going to leave a scar she thinks.

He tells her their done and she briefly thinks about thanking him, but changes her mind when he gives her a quick tetanus shot with a salacious warning to stay off the foot and future hissy fits, 'FYI, you're having a baby... it might be time to finally get a grip on yourself and let me help you get over some shit...'

She manages a weak 'Screw you!' before dissolving into miserable tears as he walk out without so much as a backward glance in her direction.

'Right back at ya!'

* * *

 

Because he tells her she needs perspective, but doesn't make her talk about feelings she wants to keep to herself, they don't talk about her meltdown for a few days. Until they do; in his usual tactful and friendly indirect way she hates so much. He's crafty about it because he chooses that time when she's softly drifting between almost sleep and wakefulness, and he's close enough to trap her in his strong arms and soft mindless murmur.

He knows she isn't going to get up and leave in a huff.

The night time shadows and darkness have a peculiar effect on her mood since she became pregnant because she finds herself less resentful around Kai and feels the strong need for some background chatter in her ear to fall into deep, irrevocable sleep.

She lay nestled on his chest in one of the Salvatore bedrooms. They're warm and peaceful about nothing in particular and serene about the lack of general normality.

He always tells her stories and magical lore he's read or may have fussed over while he was trying to find a way out for the last 18 years. Most of the time he goes on talking about some warring witch families and magical anecdotes she tunes his words out and concentrates on the tone of his voice and the idle concentric circles he runs across her back. Tonight, she finds herself half listening though because it's pretty clear he's trying to come to point with a story about longing, desire, hope, and despair all etched together against time and loneliness. It's like Shakespeare except nobody actually ever dies, but remain intensely alone on different islands seeking redemption. She's pretty damn certain he's trying to tell her how she felt about Damon, or how her longing for the idea of them together was a pipedream best moved on from.

She thinks of telling him to go to hell but then realises that hell is pretty overrated and that maybe a moot point between them, so instead she scoffs at the idea of him reading anything with romances.

'I can't believe you like romances..'

'I don't actually like them; the women are far too naive and sentimental for their own good, every page turn I feel like yelling...you idiot! quit being so gullible!, and the men are obviously too horny...'

He pauses to trace her smile with the tips of his fingers and comes to the point, 'The thing about hope is, It's great to hold on to it... but be careful it doesn't rip your sanity apart...because you live here long enough, you need to be able to do more than just exist.'

She hates that he can read her so transparently 'I'm not like you Kai...' His arms tighten over her just a little as she shifts trying to maintain their peaceful moment in the dark.

Even with the weight of the silence they still remain in each other's arms and before drifting off to sleep she feels his palm ghost over her stomach ever so gently. Then it's gone so quickly she feels like she might as well have imagined it.

* * *

 

Later, in the hypnotic haze of sleep, she asks him how he knew about her feelings for Damon and he chuckled in the dark reassuringly, pulling her even closer to him, 'Well, for one you suddenly hate pancakes...'

God she hated him for reading her so transparently.


	4. Chapter 4

Because it's much easier for someone so rational like her to be in denial, and he's unequivocally patient with her flighty emotions that threaten to overwhelm her every now and then that she finds herself constantly frightened of the next phase in her mental landscape.

* * *

 

They moved from the Salvatore boarding house after he abruptly insisted one morning that she needed to move on from her attachment to the place. She knew he had meant Damon without really saying it and incredibly ...she had agreed. They had been at the Lockwood mansion for three weeks now and Bonnie wasn't sure if she was doing better. She had sprawling nightmares that woke her up; though most of the time she couldn't remember what they were really about.

Lately, she was not a morning person at all and waking up from slumber didn't leave her particularly refreshed. She found herself needing her caffeine fix every few hours because the tiredness would settle over her so suddenly that she found herself constantly irate and useless. That and since Kai had overtaken some of her space he kept swiping her coffee cup whenever he thought she wasn't looking.

'I asked for chamomile not ginger...you got it wrong... again' She tries not the ground out the words, but the camcorder in her face this early morning made it hard to adopt that unconditional patience that surprisingly came easier to him.

'Ginger's better...at least one of us is bothered with its health benefits.'

She put the tea aside a tad more aggressively than she wanted to without saying anything to that.

Kai was sitting by the kitchen table with his elbows propped on the table, his arm supporting the invasive camcorder in her direction. He'd just taken to film her doing mundane things since they moved, like watching t.v., doing laundry, eating breakfast, looking out of the window, and sleeping. Once he'd taken an hour's worth of footage of her sleepwalking through the kitchen, opening and closing cabinets and handling sharp things; at which point he would just pull the offending item out of her grasp while she continued to re-enact some domestic activity in her fugue state.

'I need my coffee...; she tells him for the third time, feeling a yawn arising somewhere deep inside when he took a particularly loud and leisurely sip of it in front of her. 'You don't need it that much...'

'What makes you an expert on how much coffee's too much? Besides, 3 times a day isn't too much.'

'Yeah? It's not too much if you're trying to stunt 'its' growth.' She wasn't so sure she wanted to rely on advice from someone who referred to a baby as an 'it' just yet. He carried on his meticulous pursuit of her with the camcorder, this time moving the lens down to her slightly protruding belly. She wasn't quite showing yet, but at three and half months her breasts and hips were notably heavier. At least, they were to Kai because she could tell he was filming her chest shamelessly, 'Did you just zoom in at my chest again?'

'I might be enjoying some of your attributes with the zoom button, yes...'

He countered her withering look with a noncommittal grunt and continued to watch her with a slight smirk on his face while she continued to sift through more grocery he brought wrong without aptly expressing her displeasure at his childish behaviour.

They had had a new agreement last week; they would refrain from name calling, hissy fits, verbal throw downs (since physical ones weren't possible at the moment.) and they would keep the good humour, instead of all the impairing negativity between.

'Speaking of great attributes, what's with the curfew lately...?'

She's been off sex for the last few weeks. It may have had something to do with letting go of her safety net with leaving the Salvatore boarding house and partly due to the fact that her hormones were all over the place.

There were random moments where his fingers, mouth, or even his voice did something tasteful to her, but then there were times where everything felt strangely sore or tender and she couldn't stand being caressed or kissed at all. Since Kai was more the touchy feely type, she figured his sudden obsession with the camcorder, her coffee, and driving her up the wall with stuff she didn't want were his way of being grumpy about it.

'I have no idea of what you're talking about; just give me back my coffee.' She demanded venomously.

'Okay...' He says expectantly with a tone undeniably nefarious, still holding on to her coffee cup, 'First give me a kiss and make it naughty...' He winks at her bumping up her annoyance and she considers her options; she could throw the small tin of ginger tea at him, it was lightweight, but hard enough to put a dent in that lopsided smile.

But then they had an agreement, no supercharged fights. Right...

So, she tries tact instead, 'Hell will freeze over before I have sex with you again Kai...you got that?'

He looked around and then back at her like what she was saying was all big mystery to him. She picked up the milk with some more conviction and took it to the refrigerator almost missing his narrowed eyes. She assumed the camera was still rolling, 'You do realise that that statement holds almost no weight right? because hell-will never freeze over...ever. It's going to be the same almost balmy, never quite as chilly summer...forever and ever and ever...and ever.'

'Stop being a smart ass and try getting me stuff I asked for next time.'

'I only got the tea wrong, don't knock it till you try it...ginger can be pretty soothing for nerves. And nerves likes yours could probably use the soothing'

She hadn't meant to slam the fridge door as hard as she did, but he jumped slightly, hiding his annoyance with the camcorder when she did. Now she picked up the abandoned tin of ginger tea, 'What is it with you and stupid ginger?!'

His face lights up with a measured amount of repressed anger and she feels the heat from it, 'You need to give it a chance you know!? You never give anything new a chance, like this place!...'

Not this again, Bonnie sighed looking down at the tin still firmly in her hands, she hated that he was right. She hated that he knew she was having trouble sleeping because she missed the Salvatore boarding house. Her recent sleepwalking, nightmares, and distance from him, was all related and noticeable. Noticeable enough that she guiltily avoided looking at him after his outburst and they waited in silence for each other to respond somehow with her still behind the counter and Kai still at the table with the ridiculous camcorder's recording light running.

When he speaks again, his voice is gruff and she can feel that entitled, I deserve-better-than-this angry pout on his lips without even looking at him, 'Fine, I'll have the fucking ginger ...you stick to the fucking coffee.'

It's quiet for a few minutes with them completely avoiding eye contact.

So much for their agreement she thinks before bursting into inane laughter. He looked so startled by the change in her demeanour and so suspicious that it made her laugh even harder at him. It's been a while since she's laughed like this. She carried on a for a good few minutes until, she felt those tickling tremors slowly leave her body and replace them with something else entirely that was heated and pleasant when he continued to watch her with an angry frown bordering on desire.

She swallows thinking maybe she could use the ginger after all. She walks around the counter with him watching her, trailing her fingers lightly on the counter top, walking out of the kitchen with languid grace as his eyes follow her dubiously.

She pulls off her loose grey top in one fluid motion, barely looking back at him, going for her best sultry voice instead, 'You coming?...'

For a moment she hears no movement as she heads to the master bedroom, kicking off her shoes, and then she smiles when there's a noisy scramble from the kitchen with him trying to turn off the camcorder, 'Damn it, where's the off button on this...' a pause, 'I'm coming! I'll meet you in the bedroom...'

* * *

 

He left the camcorder on and it managed to record every sound they made in the bedroom, with the lens staring at the kitchen counter and the damned ginger tea tin. When he re-winded and showed Bonnie, she threw the camcorder out of the window.

* * *

 

'So? It didn't occur to you at all? Like ever? You never thought about?'

They're in the toiletries aisle and he's tossing minty fresh toothpaste and new toothbrushes into their trolleys indiscriminately, without responding to her. Bonnie felt in complete disarray when she woke up one morning and heard a light pelting of rain on the windows of the Lockwood mansion. The entire year she'd been here there hadn't been any rain whatsoever in Mystic Falls and now suddenly the sky was dull with a secretive hue of grey all over. When she nudged him awake in blind panic, he just gently shushed her and told her to go back to sleep as if it were completely normal.

Apparently, it was a normal occurrence, every few years and not something sudden or panic inducing as she had hoped. She stood by the wide French doors in the mansion, with the rain making heavy wet streaks on glass while he explained that the weather changed every few years. In the beginning years, it gave him a twinge of hope that the spell was collapsing, but then the weather would be the same for another 2-3 frustrating years before changing to something else, entirely different from the last few years. Last time it actually got more humid he told her candidly, as she stared at him grimly, saddened by the emotionless tirade of the weather.

Once she got over the shock of it and dragged him into the rain, it occurred to her that the baby might have magic abilities. Like her. She's been entertaining the thought from time to time in the last two months once they started keeping track of its development with ultrasounds and an approximate date of arrival.

They even made a calendar which was more of less an approximation of the present day calendar, with her help. If he'd thought about the baby having magic, he never mentioned it to her, and continued with their days with a perpetual eclipse every day.

But now she felt that tug of latent hope once again and it excited her.

She wanted to talk about possibilities and Kai just continued to be strangely immune to her excitement. 'Okay! Okay ...' he insisted when she started to walk away from him angrily at his indifference, 'It did occur to me ...like maybe about two times in the last few months.'

She stopped unsure of what was more disturbing, him keeping this from her, or her outrage at the idea that he didn't make it a point for discussion during their excessive banter over several things baby related. Just as she tries her darndest hard not to pout, she feels his hand on her arm, and pulls away just as he's about to turn her around to look at him, 'Look, I just don't think it's worth getting over excited over, it's not important...yet. It could take years before he or she manifest any powers, I mean come on ...for all we know the kid could be an abomination like me.'

She spun around so fast that she almost knocked some brightly coloured bottles of mouthwashes off a shelf. The palm of her hand lands aggressively on his chest before he had a chance to back up, 'Let's get one thing straight... You don't call me child an abomination...ever.'

A heated look passes between both of them as he stares from her hand on his chest steadily back to her face. He doesn't try to move back anymore and closes a hand over her wrist firmly, its warmth oddly threatening, 'I think the word you're looking for is...OUR child. It's only hard to say it the first few times, come on say it with me, OUR...child.'

She only raises an eyebrow at that, 'Why are you so obsessed with leaving suddenly?' he asks clearly puzzled at the incline in her theories.

'Why are you suddenly so obsessed with staying?!' She demanded.

He looks like he about to hurl a curse, but instead just mulls it around in his mouth and chooses something else to say, 'I'm going to go ahead and be an asshole here; in case it's slipped her highness's mind...you chose this for us and now you're expecting some miracle to literally rain down on you?'

She wants to hurt him for saying it, but instead she pulls her hand out of his grasp and stomps away from him on a rough note, her voice almost breaking with the raw emotion of it, 'I need some air...'

She walks outside in the chilly air noticing the rain had finally shuddered to a stop. It made her chest heave with inexplicable sadness so she just kept walking, leaving him at the store.

* * *

 

It's late when he finds her. She's sitting at one of the benches in The Grill sobbing unrestrainedly when he makes his presence known with a deadpan, 'How's it going...?'

Hearing him walk inside, she didn't move from her seat because it's hardly a surprise and because there isn't really a point; Mystic Falls is a small town and she could only get as far as the grill, on foot, in her condition. She had developed a waddle and her feet tend to give up on her after a fifteen minutes; sometimes even less.

He walked around the empty bar and lingered over all the alcohol on display while she tried to compose herself. After pointedly ignoring something that resembled tequila he took a seat placidly on the bench next to her. And there's a sigh which is palpable with exasperation.

'So, after staking out your place, I waited at the Salvatore boarding house, thinking you might show up. I actually got drunk for two hours...and then I thought I should sober up a little before looking for you because I wanted to metaphorically wring your neck...and damn, that's new, even for me.'

She can tell he wants to say more because he's downright furious with her now. The cold and distant kind of furious and she's not surprised about any of it. For six hours, she wandered the town, looking for a sign that the rain wasn't just something natural and happened every few years as an adjustment in the spell; that it was somehow connected to an escape route or a signal from her friends that were still waiting for her.

But when she found herself tired and sodden with rain water, she felt her resolve give out and she just waited for him to show up.

Having had hours to think over what she was going to say to him, she still finds that the words don't come out as easy as she hoped, she doesn't feel like rambling on because her eyes feel so tired suddenly, 'What if the baby gets sick or hurt, or something...what are we going to do? I just don't feel like this is right, any of it...'

'Oh? Then maybe you just shouldn't have...' Before he can finish she whips around to look at him, deadly serious.

Somehow she knows he's going to make her feel even worse about sending her magic away all those months ago and she doesn't let him say it. She almost swats him on the arm for it though, 'Don't say it! Don't you say it, If you say it, I'm going to literally kill you and leave your ass here, and then I'll go somewhere where you won't be able to find me.'

She watches his knuckle whiten with the effort of keeping them clenched and the deafening silence between them creates an atomic charge of ugly emotions she didn't want them to unleash at each other tonight. Instead she just sighs with the effort of holding onto more tears, 'It just doesn't feel real...any of it...'

After a throaty pause in their silence, and she feels a rustle of movement from him, as he pulls out something small and folded from his jacket's pocket, 'Oh it's real alright...?' he tells her before pushing a pastel yellow babygrow with the words 'I'm yours' imprinted on it in colourful thread, in her line of sight, and she's too stunned to look at him because she's already reaching for the soft material. 'It's so tiny...' she says it to herself in wonderment because they hadn't started getting things for the baby yet and she still was in awe of its tiny dimensions. 'They're all tiny in the beginning, but they start growing really fast afterwards...'

She doesn't say anything because the semi darkened grill isn't so gloomy suddenly. She feels a soft stitch of comfort looking at the babygrow, it's almost sentient with some kind of life, and she finds she can't take her eyes off of it.

'We should move back to the boarding house, it might be better for you...maybe we can turn Damon's room into a nursery.' He plays cautiously as she struggles not to give him a dirty look at the idea of the nursery. She silently appreciates the sentiment but brushes off the offer because she's knows she needs to move on from her infatuation with the Salvatore's and to some extent they're already 'settled' where they are, she just needed to validate her strength.

Except, walking from here to the Lockwood place was going to be pain and the first thing she asks him is about a ride home, 'Please tell me you brought the car...'

'No, I didn't bring the car... I didn't want to scare you off. Besides, it would have turned into this ugly chase, with my car and you trying to waddle away quickly.'

This time she does swat him on the arm, hard.

She tells him to leave her at the grill because she too darned tired to move. She could of have fallen asleep on the bench, literally, any given moment. He debated quietly for a minute before muttering in low irate tones, coming around to the other side and picking her up in his arms.

'Are you going to carry me all the way?' she asks partly with awe, as he walks out of the grill into a warmer night and he chuckles in that condescending way that almost always elicits an eye roll from her, 'I'm going to carry you for exactly less than two minutes, after which, you'll feel sorry for me, get down and walk with me rest of the way. Are we clear on this?'

She says nothing and holds on him as the gentle jostling motion makes her drowsy with sleep in the night illuminated by only the stark moonlight.

* * *

 

When she wakes up, it's still dark out and she realises that she's in bed by herself. The pastel babygrow lies innocently on her nightstand.

So, she tip toes like a ghost in the corridors and hallways until she finds him uncomfortably cramped on a three seater. Interrupting him mid snore, she tugged at his arm until he woke up enough to meet her gaze and quietly follow her to the bedroom.


	5. Chapter 5

Now she's acutely aware of his presence and also when he's not around.

Once, she wakes up in total darkness to find an empty space by her side, a lingering scent of soap and musk with no sign of him, and something like worry, grips her; that or the sudden realization that something inside was possibly somersaulting and throwing light punches.

It was an hour after midnight and after padding around stealthily, she finds him sitting at the kitchen table surrounded by a large collection of open textbooks, studiously reading one and fingers splayed over another open textbook.

She doubted he even heard her creep up on him. 'What are you doing?'

He doesn't look caught or particularly concerned that she's discovered him and goes back to reading with a short, 'Go back to sleep.'

If she hadn't been curious she would call him a few colourful things and turn on her heel and go back to bed. Instead, she pulls out a chair opposite to him and grabs one of the books to inspect the title and is surprised to read out aloud, 'The birth book...everything you need to know to have a satisfying birth-hey!...' He snatches the book out of her hands before she can read anymore and gathers the pile of pregnancy and birth related books closer to him, out of her reach.

He uncaps a highlighter from out of the pile somewhere, looking all frowns and seriousness, the crease between his eyebrows betraying nothing more. 'This is some serious shit...I need to wrap my head around it all, before...well.' he explains lightly, looking at her growing bump and she subconsciously soothes her bump feeling like science experiment.

'I thought your mom had like eight kids or something...shouldn't this be easy for you?'

He only looks up from carefully highlighting some passage on the book in front of him to give her a dry, withering stare, 'I also remember telling you me and my parents...weren't exactly close, not with the whole I'm an abomination and them wanting to have more and more kids until they found those special little twins they could love and stand to be affectionate with. So, as a rule, when she popped out another one of those special snowflakes I was never around.'

If this was a year back, she might have flinched at the scathing tone, but the wrinkled forehead and the sullen, almost drawn expression on his face told her he was under a considerable amount of strain. Their passive aggressive banter usually brought out the good humor in him so she ignored the tone and crossed her arms, letting a yawn escape her, 'It's not a big deal Kai, millions of women all over the world have children every day. All I have to do it stay calm and let my body tell me what it needs.'

He chuckles maliciously, giving her his best 'you're-going-to-regret-this' look before brandishing a well highlighted passage on  _tearing during labor_  in front of her and she finds that she is suitably freaked out.

* * *

Later in bed, he tries to calm her by telling her that pregnancy and labor were very much like a Lord of the Rings trilogy, taking hours and hours of reading, toil, blood, and painful trouble; except, there was a grandiose happy ending to make up for all of that teeth gnashing and pain bearing.

She isn't sure she's completely comforted by the analogy because an hour later she's still awake while he snores comfortably nearby with a slight smile on his lips.

* * *

Their resentment was limited to somewhat pettier things now; like how he hated the way she skimmed the sides of the tub of cookies and cream with her spoon instead of just taking a spoonful from the center, or how it irritated her when he came home smelling like pork rinds because she told him she did not want to see them anywhere in the house.

One afternoon, they're entirely comfortable on one of the overstuffed couches, with her legs on his lap and a tub of rocky road they pass each other between grunts of acknowledgement while they studiously watch groundhog day on TV.

There's a significant amount of tension in the air as Bill Murray figures out he's living in some kind of repeating hell and she isn't sure whether she should change the channel when Kai's fingers grip her calves tighter. Before she can make the suggestion, he rumbles out what's on his mind in that calm, indifferent way she still can't seem to get used to.

' You've been keeping a secret name journal.'

Zap!

She's not completely stunned by the accusation, but continues to skim the sides of the rocky road tub contemplatively until he whips out  _said_  journal from behind him.

'Hey!..' she starts, trying to lunge for the small brown leather bound book he opens with a smirk, ignoring the now, mostly empty ice cream tub, which tumbles to the floor as he traps her legs firmly with one arm to keep her from moving.

'I took the liberty of going through all the names you wrote down and crossed out those 'I' thought were...inappropriate.' He says it with a smile, and she suppresses the fervent urge to hit him. 'Inappropriate?...'

The condescending nod from him does nothing to comfort her and she crosses her arms defensively looking away. 'And what names did you, pray tell, find offensive?'

He holds the journal open with unnecessary efficiency and looks back at her with mock disdain. 'Ah ah, I'll tell you...first example...Jeremy.'

'What's wrong with the name Jeremy?! It's a perfectly nice name.' She tries to kick him in the ribs, but he stalls her attempts with his arm. 'It is a perfectly nice name, a perfectly nice name that also happens to belong to your ex-boyfriend back home.' He says, as if that explains his issue with it.

Instead of taking the childish route of sticking her tongue out at his she decides to rile him up a little more. 'He's not my ex, we never broke up.' and that does the trick because they glare at each other for a good few seconds before he squeezes one of her feet affectionately. 'All the more reason than to forget about that name, considering, how it isn't the fruit of his loins you're carrying and all, I mean...'

She wrinkled her nose at him. 'You're just disgusting you know that?' He went ahead and drew a few more lines through the name just to make it clear to her that they would not be naming the baby anything resembling her boyfriend.

'Hmmm...I disagree with your definition of disgust.'

He rattled off a few more names he thought were unsuitable. 'Tyler, Alaric, Jessie, James, Matt, Stefan?...lame. Did you leave any of the Mystic Falls gang out of your preferred list of names?'

'As a matter of fact, I did.' She growls. There are a few other generic names she halfheartedly added towards the end of top choices, just so she could feel a little less pathetic about paying homage to her Mystic Falls family.

'And ...you couldn't resist adding the Salvatore brothers to the list I see...'

She blinks, slowly, once, twice and then sighs thinking about men and their ridiculously conscious need to be jealous of ex boyfriends, almost lovers and what-could-have-been relationships. 'I only added Stefan... because we were actually friends for a long time before Damon and I even started being civil to each other.'

He's continues to be faintly perturbed by the idea and hesitates striking off Stefan's name off the list, and asks speculatively, 'So... He's not a vampire and doesn't fill some of his hours hunting down people to eat...?'

'He's not that kind of vampire...!' She tries in vain to fault his logic by telling him about Stefan's years of struggle with human blood and his affinity to be the hero of virtually every horror story in Mystic Falls, but after thirty five minutes of hand gestures and explanations Kai doesn't seem to be buying into Stefan's nobility as easily as she hoped.

'So, you're argument is that he's a reformed vampire?'

She's almost certain she can pick up the lamp behind her and launch it at him with the right amount of pull, but she calms and tries a gentler approach. 'What's wrong with that? I pretend you're a reformed psychopath practically all the time.' A resolutely wicked smile plays on his lips at the declaration and some of the tension drains from her shoulders, as he leaves Stefan's name untouched for now. 'Fine...but we'll leave the noble vampire's name as the last possible option.'

She shrugs. Compromise is after all the lie their relationship is built on. She can give a little when he pulls and when she pushes sometimes, he can take the shove without losing the thread. Instead, she talks about Matt Donovan and his inherent good nature, his good looks and, her absolute platonic relationship to him over the years. That seems to improve Kai's mood considerably and he leaves Matt's name on the list a little less grudgingly.

'So, Matty-blue-eyes then...'

She tries not to let the irritation get the better of her, but it proves to be difficult because she isn't that fussed about what to name the baby. Her concerns are less trivial and centered around what the baby would need from her and whether she'll be ready for his arrival, but then he admonishes her over her disinterest in deciding a name. 'Names are important in witching families Bonnie...they actually have power. My parents didn't just name me Malachai because they knew I'd grow up to hate their guts you know?'

She snorted, that explained the size of his ego.

'Well...what kind of name do you think we should keep?' she asks this with a straight face because she's prepared to scoff and guffaw at any suggestion he makes. 'I think, you should think about names that mean something to you...something more than old friendships... maybe, family names.'

'Family names...' she repeats absently, not entirely agitated by the suggestion. It hadn't really occurred to her and it wasn't a completely terrible idea.

'To start of...my dad was an egotistical asshole who treated me like crap for twenty two years and then he locked me up here, so as far as family names go, he doesn't really get a vote...what about your dad?'

Dragging her eyes away from his intense scrutiny she ignores the tension building between her shoulders again because she doesn't feel like talking about her family right now. And because it reminds her of their individual fates and it all still feels like an invisible, heavy weight on her shoulders; one that she doesn't know how to change the density of yet. 'What about him?'...he wasn't a witch; I got my magic from my mom. He didn't even want anything to do with magic in the first place.'

He listens to her trying to find a balance between her like and dislike of her late father's traits without interrupting her, except for gentle circles he draws under her feet. They don't really talk about family and deaths, unless in passing, or sarcasm. So, when she starts, the details are almost pouring out of her reverently. She tells him about her father's death and Silas with Stefan's face doing the deed, and doesn't miss the unmistakable look of appreciation that crosses his eyes when she talks about Silas.

This time she does manage to kick him in the ribs because he isn't anticipating it. 'We are not naming the baby Silas!'

Kai looks up at her almost innocently, rubbing his side. 'Uh... I did not know that was an option woman.'

After a pointed look from her he quickly added, 'I would  _never_  suggest such a thing, ever... seriously.'

She ignores him then and just re-tunes into the movie.

* * *

Later on when she checks the journal he's left on her nightstand, she notices he's crossed out Stefan's name on the list this time and written a note next to it in thick brackets.

_Doppelganger of Silas._

There was only one name he left untouched on the page.

_Matty-blue-eyes._

* * *

Her center of gravity is strangely off during her sixth month and her entire body almost teeters sometimes when she leans on side for too long.

When she falls off the bed for the first time close to dawn with a sharp 'whap' onto the thick carpeted floor, and struggles to get up, he's so quiet and still that she's pretty sure he must be awake.

'Are you- what was that?'

'Get up you stupid bastard and help me!'

After a pause and a gentle rustle of covers, he raises himself on an elbow and squints at her because of the light filtering in through the curtains, 'First, why don't you try asking me nicer...'

'Now...' She grinds out as nicely as she can before he gets out of bed and picks her off the floor. 'You need to be more careful.' He tells her supporting her weight and pulling her onto the bed sleepily.

In the process, his hand lands on somewhere on her stomach and a series of kicks ensue in rapid succession. It's odd to see him rapt with attention and wide eyed at the response she takes herself has been taking so lightly for the last two months.

It occurs to her; he's always busy making lists, reading books, and debating her choice of names, or charting the clinical progress of the baby. This was the first time he felt the baby move and he looked both guarded and positively frightened by the life inside.

Sometime later, when she's drifted off into dreamless sleep, she realises he's left the bed. When she wakes up after a few hours, less exhausted and curious, she finds him asleep on the overstuffed couch downstairs.


End file.
